Unknown starts us off with a timely one.
Ken for non-Americans like me why do they call your baseball competition a world series?
Because people here think America IS the world.
Actually, when the term was coined a few centuries ago America was pretty much the only country playing organized baseball so technically the term applied. And now it’s just a “thing.”
Matt wonders:
Sometimes there are episodes where an established cast character isn't in the episode/script. For example, "The Late Captain Pierce" from 1975. Radar isn't in the episode even though it would be four more seasons before he left.
Are these absentees scheduled in advance? Or is it a "last minute" thing where a script had to be adjusted/rewritten to accommodate?
It depends on the actor’s contract. Sometimes an actor will sign a deal for say 10 out of 13 but included is the stipulation that their credit appear in every episode.
For the episode you mentioned, Gary Burghoff might have been sick and just written out that week.
In the first year of CHEERS, three days into rehearsal for an episode Nick Colasanto went into the hospital with pleurisy. So we worked all night writing him out of the episode. Then came the weekend and on Monday (day four) he was back. So we had to write him back in. That was a fun week.
From Mike Bloodworth:
The 9/28 episode of The Orville was a complete rip-off of the Star Trek:TOS episode, "For The World is Hollow..." Now, they're not the first sci-fi show to steal from S.T. and they won't be the last. And other shows seem to shamelessly steal plot lines and jokes from movies and other series. As it says in Ecclesiastes, "...there is no new thing under the Sun." So, what is your opinion about shows that use other writers' material? Other than an obvious homage. Have you ever "borrowed" jokes or story lines from other shows. And how do they not get sued for plagiarism?
“Homages” get into murky area, at least for me. Unless it is CLEARLY a nod to a specific work there is the danger that the new work is lifted. How do you achieve that clarity? Generally you have to do something meta that lets the audience know that you know you’re treading on someone else’s property.
In terms of similar story areas, this too is a gray area. Often two shows will unknowingly hit upon a similar story. The showrunner of “Show A” sees a story on “Show B” that is close to the one he has airing next week. But both shows were filmed months before. It’s not like the showrunner from “Show A” says, “That’s great. Let’s do that,” gathers the staff, writes and films the show the next day and have it ready to air on Tuesday.
That said, on shows I’ve worked on, anytime we’re looking for stories, if someone pitches something and one of the writers says “They did something like that on (pick any show),” we automatically just throw it out. No discussion, no rationalizing. It’s tossed.
Let’s just say other showrunners don’t strictly adhere to that policy.
And finally, Carson Clark asks:
You've written before about a good writer does his or her best to service all of the main characters on a show. This made me wonder, was there pressure to write content for Moose, a.k.a. Eddie, on Frasier? Was he treated like a character or more like a prop?
Moose never counted lines.
We saw him as a character but tried to use him in a limited fashion and always conferred with his remarkable trainer, Matilda de Cagny (pictured above with Moose) to make sure whatever we asked was easily doable for Moose.
What’s your Friday Question?
from By Ken Levine http://ift.tt/2yVWGQr
Breaking News: Friday Questions - News Paper
0 komentar:
Post a Comment